Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Seahawks analyst Matty F. Brown thinks the Vikings have the coaching edge in Seattle

Episode Date: December 20, 2024

Matthew Coller talks with Seahawks writer and podcaster Matty F. Brown about where Seattle stands this season and his expectation that the Vikings will be the better team on Sunday Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here and joining me for the first time ever on the show from the Seattle Overload podcast and Seahawks on tape sub stack, Matty F. Brown, my favorite Seattle follow on Twitter, largely because Seattle people are often dealing with a lot of emotional things with that Seahawks team on Twitter, largely because Seattle people are often dealing with a lot of emotional things with that Seahawks team on Twitter. Usually grind the tape, but one of my favorite analysts out there, Matty, welcome to the show, man. How are you? I'm excited. Thanks so much for having me. I know it's the first time I've been on the podcast, but you've been a great help to me in

the past when it comes to Substack and things like that. And I know you're doing amazing stuff when it comes to Minnesota coverage. So hopefully I can fit the bill when it comes to Seahawks stuff. We've got a lot to talk about and I'm really excited for this matchup. Well, I appreciate that, man. And I've loved how you've grown your brand out with the Seattle coverage. And so we need to talk about this because all other Seattle matchups that we've had with the Vikings have always been the Russell Wilson era, the Pete Carroll era. And it got pretty weird during that time with the Mike Zimmer, Pete Carroll going at it. But now this is very different.

We got younger coaches. They're more attractive. They're more modern. And Gino Smith is now the quarterback. He's a little banged up in this game. different we got younger coaches they're more attractive they're more modern and uh geno smith is now the quarterback he's a little banged up in this game but i i want to know from you about the geno smith experience because every time i watch my eyes are either blowing out of my head because he makes some insane throw that i can't believe or mind exploding because he makes some insane throw that I can't believe. Right.

So explain to me what it has been like to follow along the rollercoaster of Geno Smith. Well, I think he is one of those like classic pocket passes and he is an expert at kind of navigating his round of pocket and, and being a drop back passer and he does some really good things but as we all know if you're a pocket passer and your offensive line and your pass protection is struggling that's when even the best guys mistakes will creep into their game they'll I think Gino's guilty at times of trying to press too hard. I don't know what it is after this last week, but I think he was eighth in turnover, where the throw percentage, like eighth best.

So he wasn't necessarily, I mean, that depends who's charting that. But it's not necessarily bad. But I think the more his environment around him has become shaky. His play inevitably has become shaky too. But you just have to look at the type of offense they're trying to run to see how much, you know, what their opinion of him is. When they traded for Sam Howell in the offseason, there was some talk about new regime.

Maybe they have a competition. Maybe they're not that high on Gino but clearly like that they place a lot on his shoulders they're really kind of doing everything they can in terms of like a passing from uh well passing offense in general so whether that you know that's too much whether they have the offensive line to be able to do those types of things and you know if that's too much whether they have the offensive line to be able to do those types of things and you know if that's helped you know um moving forward i i would you know you could have some concerns over that and like you say uh there's been a couple i mean he's always been a shooter he'll always throw tight window stuff and and bet on his arm and bet on his intelligence in reading out concepts. But I think maybe there's like one or two throws I can think of

where I'm like, yeah, that's a turnover-worthy throw. That's not a good decision. That's uncharacteristic. That's forcing it when you didn't need to. The offensive line part, I was just looking at the snap counts from Seattle's offensive line and uh a lot of names on that list for this year for for the offensive line where does it stand right now because this to me is really on both sides and we'll get into the defense but the the matchup i

think is going to be determined on whether seattle can handle everything that brian floor is is throwing at that offensive line and let me tell, it's going to be a lot. There's going to be a lot of different looks. They are going to force Seattle to pass things off, to communicate, to deal with all sorts of rush looks. And from what I saw against the Packers, there might be some troubles there. Oh, yeah. So right now, and this is at the time of recording,

and I also haven't seen today's injury report out of practice. But right now, I think a right tackle, they've got Abraham Lucas back, who's the guy that they feel quite high about. He had, like, off-season knee surgery. That's exciting. But then a right guard, they've got a sixth-round pick, a rookie in Saltea Laumea, who is kind of struggling,

like a rookie sixth-round pick would look like, I think. And also, he was more of a tackle in college, so he's kind of dealing with the whole convert there thing. Center, they had Connornor williams who retired that's the name people are probably familiar with from his days in miami um and now then they had olu olu atimi who was a second year player was the best college football center um and then he's hurt his knee so now it's a third string center in a guy called jalen sundell who he came into the game uh last week and looked okay looked very athletic getting out in space and pulling

but in terms of you know you're talking about brian floyds and what he can dial up all those twists the the amount of stuff he's going to throw at a third string um rookie center that's uh a lot on on the guy's plate so yeah it's the right side is and the center spot is it is where i think teams have had success but like laken tomlinson is you know a left guard he's like in every you know like a maybe slightly below solid vet his best skill is his availability but john schneider perhaps infamously said in the offseason that guards get um overdrafted and overpaid um and he then let damian lewis who'd been pretty solid as a left guard walk he did get very highly paid by carolina um but like if you compare carolina's interior offensive line to se Seattle's um you know there's a reason that

they get overdraft and overpaid and Schneider knows that but the the comment is aging poorly given how how the uh the pass protection is playing out even the run blocking I'd also like to say like and I'm sure you're going to get onto this but the the offensive line is being put in pretty poor situations by a variety of aspects but like you know that if your offensive line isn't the type i mean no offensive line the nfl can drop back as much as ryan gubbs asked the new offensive coordinator who was with the washington huskies um how much he's asked them to do this season and and there's a lot of things you can get into about just like run pass balance being off but also his overall like play calling uh like types

like the buckets of plays be it like a deeper drop back a short drop back the play action shotgun or or you know formational balance stuff as well where that's way out of whack so i don't think the offensive lines as bad as they've been perhaps made to look either um but all of this means i look at this from brian flores and i see what minnesota's doing on defense i'm like this is a dream matchup for brian flores i think this could get very very ugly and that's all forgetting that gino smith um hurt his knee and they don't really you know he's a full participant in practice but they're you know no one actually knows what he he hurt in terms of his knee like he just hurt his knee so his mobility might be limited he's very good at moving around the pocket but it's another factor

to all of this so i think it could be a good one for minnesota yeah the third string center element is going to be big because the vikings do so much up the middle and if you look back at the chicago game i was just, I just posted my film. Look at that. And the number of times that they have Blake Cashman coming up the middle, uh, Jamin Davis, who they added, that's kind of his job is to come in and just rush straight up the middle, but they do a lot of really creative stuff. Something that I noticed was, uh, early in the season, they were having a Blake Cashman lineup over the middle kind of a gap, but then rush outside and hit the tackle, swing the outside linebacker back inside.

But then last week they faked that. So Cashman starts to go toward the tackle, then turns around and loops around and the bears are looking around, go, wait a minute, where did, where did the middle linebacker go? There's so much creativity that goes into the rush plan up the middle. Josh Metellus is part of this as well, where you never really know where he's going to line up and where he could come from. This is going to be a huge challenge for them. And if Geno can't move in the pocket as well, that's kind of sitting duck situation. is a solution though from what we've seen to facing the Vikings blitz plans and that is the quarterback throwing the ball real quick

getting it out of his hands and into the hands of the receivers this worked for Detroit this worked for the Los Angeles Rams and if Kirk Cousins hadn't thrown two horrendous interceptions, it was actually working for Kirk Cousins as well. Middle of the field, getting rid of the ball quickly. Does Seattle do this? Can Seattle do this? Because I think that they're always hunting big plays for Geno Smith. Makes sense because he's got a cannon.

But if he can get rid of the ball quickly and execute underneath stuff, there is spaces that are left by this Vikings defense when they're sending extra rushers. Yeah. I mean, Jackson Smith and Jigba's really emerged like heading into the season, the second year, first round out of Ohio state, there's, you know, a question over how is he going to get the football when you've got like the two historically target dominant players in Tyler Lockett and DK Metcalf and what's actually ended up happening is Lockett's kind of dipped off and and JSN's emerged there's like a real kind of almost like a number 1.5 in the offense like a you know he's getting there

to being like I mean if you look at his production he's been the number one receiver over the last you know five or so weeks and he is a guy who can go over the middle and and will is very adjunct and separate there but um honestly the the offense has very clear like um formationancies, receiver split tenancies. And it's the type of stuff where when I watch the Vikings and I know I'm familiar with Shaquille Griffin, obviously, because he started his career in Seattle. But I look at the Vikings defensive backroom

and ordinarily, if this was a more kind of balanced offense and they had more variety and they mixed things up better I'd feel pretty good about Seattle's receiver group um going up against uh the Vikings um but with how they're constructed right now like they're very I know it's from an outside perspective you'd think yeah they are kind of hunting the deep play but their explosive play rate this season's way down they've really struggled to get the ball deep down the field um metcalf's struggling i think he's a bit banged up as well but it's um yeah like i said i think i think this is one where if if do stuff, like a lot of stuff against the Vikings' defense, I'd be pretty shocked.

One thing that has emerged the last... Well, I can't really say the last game because they barely ran the football despite it. And they were playing from two scores down, but they barely ran the football. But they were still successful-ish when they did it. and then the two weeks prior was in the run game uh pulling um pulling people running like gap scheme you know putting like a center and a guard or the backside guard and the tackle round and and letting sharp zach charbonnet who's um become a part of the offense a bigger

part of the offensive ken walker dealing with an injury um that's been a thing and then the week before that against the jets uh they ran um duo so like a power concept without the puller um another gap scheme concept um and they're having great success with that uh so i'd be interested like i actually think one of the more underrated things about flores like watching from afar and like really admiring the Vikings defense is how well constructed the run defense is like just from schematic sound standpoint um how do you get into those like 6-2 fronts and like uh the ability to use guys like Metellus and and show like too high and spin him down as though he's like the weak side inside backer and there's just so stout up front like the types of players they have unsung names who I mean I I'm blanking on their names right now but that kind of is my point that they're they're not the flashiest necessarily players

but everyone's doing their job everyone's being disciplined um and I love Greenard on the edge the way he can set an edge is um again I think very underrated so I I again would like to see Seattle be able to have some success in the run game then show that they have layers off that um but I am not too confident and again looking at Minnesota and how O'Connell he has a fairly high pass rate each year right but um if you look at how he blends his run action into a lot of his passing game concepts, that is like they're playing a different sport to what Seattle's doing on offense right now.

I am envious, but again, at least we'll see it from one side. You did sound a little jealous there. Yeah, a tiny bit. I saw some little stars in your eyes about o'connell a couple of different things there uh yours are you suggesting jonathan bullard is not a household name i i uh jonathan bullard jerry tillery jaylen redmond harrison phillips but truly the most underrated position group because they don't have stars and those guys jobs are not to get pressure this is kind

of an old school three four type of deal that you know bill belichick would use where they move bodies so other people can have lanes to go after the quarterback or blow up run plays in the back field and a lot of it is just not being moved it really the key or not allowing the guy to get the reach block or just, hey, I'm going to take you over here. And the other guy is going to take somebody over there. And then here's Blake Cashman running in. And the only guy who's there is maybe a running back who he just runs over. It's really clever the way that they use those defensive tackles slash traditional three, four defensive ends. And I think it's also a little bit money saving too, because you don't have to spend $20 million a year on a Jonathan Bullard, but the guys out there playing 700 snaps.

So that that's clever when teams have run against them, they've had a lot more success. So there is that part of it as well. I mean, that goes for anything. If you're in second and four, it's much easier than second and eight, but there aren't a lot of teams that have really run successfully against this Vikings defense because of those guys. And because of the tacklers that they have, but I did want to circle back to your point about Kevin O'Connell versus the Seattle offense, because I don't, I mean, you have to really ask somebody who studies the film to get the details. But I remember sauce Gardner talking about facing Kevin O'Connell and talking about how so many things look similar and then break differently that it's very hard to anticipate where guys are going to go based on tendencies. And what you described to me sounded like what college offenses are.

Like they can be clever, but a lot of times they have to be a little limited because of just the players you're dealing with and the time that you're dealing with. So it becomes Cliff Kingsbury's had this problem as well, where the tendencies as a season goes along, they end up getting figured out and if you're giving brian flores any hints to the game plan it's going to be a problem i want to throw this um this stat out at you this really popped to me geno smith when he's got a clean pocket

this year has a 91 pff grade 105 quarterback rating, Gino Smith under pressure, which is almost 40% of the time, 57 quarterback rating, five touchdowns, 11 picks, which I know is not the best metric, but there's a, there is a massive gulf between Gino Smith when he's been pressured and when he's had an opportunity to throw the ball. And what's crazy about that is last season, Gino under pressure. Um, there was like half of a season where he's actually performing better under pressure than he was um without pressure um a big part of the offense is uh on plays where pressured it sounds obvious but uh for whatever reason but you know lots of things go into this but guys aren't open when he's pressured so then the ball

doesn't come out like i think why gino is such a like a almost like a hipster quarterback like he's a big a lot of people who watch the tape and i think um nationally as you know more people have you know tuned into seattle and got more familiar with their issues and their strengths and everything but i think a lot of the reasons people like him is um he he plays quarterback in like a very logical way like for someone sitting up you know sitting in like a dark film room watching all 22 while i don't know eating a bag of cheese puffs or whatever i've never done that but uh but you you're watching it through and you're pausing at each point you go ah he's reading here and he's reading here and he's reading here and he's reading here and he's playing within the structure and the timing

and the available pocket he has. Why I think it's been so bad this year is guys haven't been open, route distribution's been poor, and they've had so many issues that, well, if you're pressured, are you just going to keep taking the sack? Are you going to try and force things? I don't think gina's done that as much as maybe some people would say but it has started to creep into the game as you spoke about the start and um yeah it's uh it's a pretty depressing it's a depressing watch right now and i don't see really it feels too late like they came in it's a great point you made about um cliff

kingsbury i hadn't thought of it like that but i do think that's uh it's the similar kind of issues are happening like they came in passing loads then i imagine during the bye week and mike mcdonald probably said hey we probably need to up our run rate now because teams have figured out that we're just doing shotgun drop back you've kind of pushed that to the limit um we we probably need to flesh out other aspects of the offense a bit more like and it's it's all very kind of half-baked like play action for instance from under center they only ever fake to the weak side um yet they never run to the weak side um so their play action is a very obvious tell to the linebackers that hey the the mesh with the running back is weak also to protect it because the offensive line was struggling kind of selling run and staying kind of low they show very big high hats which again that's not really gonna get

guys biting so oftentimes you know be at the bottom of his drop in play action and these will be plays where he will end up getting pressured most likely he'll hit his back foot he'll start to hitch up and no one is open and the linebacker hasn't even come downhill the second level hasn't come downhill they're all underneath the roots and and it's just it's just really poor so I'm very negative on on this uh Seattle offense I think at this point I've I've seen enough um at the start of the year I likened it to it's like if if you're a kid and you're told hey you can't have chocolate cake until you eat your vegetables and maybe have some bread and butter like do all those good things and

Ryan Grubbs just like no no i'm just gonna have chocolate cake and he's having chocolate cake like every day like five days a week five times a week five times a day like it's like no stop stop eating the chocolate cake we need to have some nourishment here um like we probably we need to tie things together heck let's have a let's have a anyway i've taken that analogy far enough but but yeah it's it's bad um i like i like that i like that a lot that threw me off i had this statistic all uh ready to throw at you and then uh the chocolate cake thing got me i'm sorry but uh they only run play action 16 of the time and average 6.5 yards per attempt on play action. And just to put that in context, let me quickly throw out, let me pull up Sam Darnold in play

action. Oh, this is going to be sad. The way, like I said, the way, the way the Vikings tile that in, it's just a thing of beauty like objectively like loving football and like loving you know cool design and and cool uh play calling um it's yeah i really admire what um ko c is able to do compared to uh and and it's always so to appreciate certain things you have to see the other side of it because gino has been a very effective play action quarterback prior to this season. Like he's very good at it.

And just think that's one whole section of plays that you're not good at. And when you have been good at it, there's other things like that too. But, you know, to have an effective offense, you can't just suddenly get bad at one thing you were good at because then that's a whole chunk you're missing. Yeah, and it's something which is on Mike McDonald's mind. Like his press conference on Monday, he was asked about if you need to run the ball effectively in order for play action pass to work, despite, you know, there being some data

which may or may not suggest a relationship, even though there obviously is one. I just don't think they've found it yet, but at least analytically. But anyway, he said, I stand on both sides of the argument. I think it's more based on the sets and the protections and the situations that dictate what defenses can do in some of those situations.

We have a good play-action-pass game, probably should see more of it, frankly. To a certain extent, the effectiveness of your run game affects play-action game, especially if you get it really going but those are good plays and i think for me when he mentioned sets protections and situations that's all the things we i've just spoke about um so he he sees it and yeah i think the the ryan grubb hire was very ambitious like he spoke about wanting to be a physical offense he spoke about

um wanting to you know have that identity on offense now no one's going to come out and say hey we want to be soft as whatever um but at the same time when you think physically think ah he's going to run the ball it's going to be like um the harbors who you know he learned under um it's going to be greg roman we're going to get heavy personnel we're going to pound the rock then you know they hire ryan grubb which that isn't immediately what comes to mind but you're like ah washington he very much maximized the talent he had there he had penix he had those great trio of receivers he did a really good job so okay this is very ambitious what an interesting band how is it going to play out um and it's just not it's not playing out it's really struggling gifting is hard but here's a hint give the gift of connection from

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This is where Kevin O'Connell, coming from his full coaching background in the nfl and he starts with a shanahan team in washington and then he goes to the mcveigh and what these guys understand is how to each week make it all look the same and then suddenly make it all look different and to circle back to those play actions that so remember Seattle's only running them 16% of the time and averaging 6.5 yards per pass attempt that's not even including the sacks that Gino has taken the Vikings are running at 28% of the time for 11 yards per pass attempt with Sam Darnold 14 of his touchdowns have come on play action and all these coaches always say well I just want my quarterback to be able to play

point guard out there and then make a couple special plays a game. Well, play action is the most point guardy point guard thing that they can do, which is usually the reads are kind of there for you. And it does draw defenders, regardless of how much the run game impacts it or not, which is an interesting discussion. I feel like coaches get asked about this all the time. And it or not, which is an interesting discussion. I feel like coaches get asked about this all the time. And it's like, did you see that study a long time ago? And I, you know, I, I, the thing is that just because,

and this goes for medical science and all other fields of research, just because we don't have the numbers at this moment to show something doesn't mean it doesn't exist. The play action game is different when you have aaron jones from when they had alexander madison because you have to respect aaron jones we saw the vikings throw a touchdown on play action last week where kevin byard the safety for the bears was like staring at aaron jones and then like oh wait i was supposed to be back there because jones had had two explosive runs on a

particular drive so maybe on a macro level over 32 teams over a thousand plays each it's hard to pinpoint but in a given game given game plan given play caller the best probably make that work and there was another thing just to add to that that pff looked at a while ago with some of their data researchers about linebackers moving and the next gen stats and how the linebackers came forward first before dropping back and and how often that happened and you know just it's clear that you can make space with those plays and the seahawks are not using them straight drop back team sounds like a feast for uh Brian Flores but let's uh go over to the other side of the football here's what's crazy to me uh I look

at all the every every game I'm gonna look at the other teams pff grades and see our who's playing who's getting snaps what does it say about them who's getting pressures data when i look at all the grades and the data it all looks pretty darn good for seattle's defense and then i go to the results the yards against the points against and i'm like that doesn't that's not that it's not terrible but it's also not as good as you would expect when you look at this d line and you look at Leonard Williams production, boy, a mafia who everybody here knows very well, dream on Jones is a good player. I mean, there's, there's dudes putting up a lot of pressure. There's cornerbacks who everybody knows. Why isn't it better? I see a good point. Cause I think to understand I'm, I am a bit of a historian and like to understand where uh the

defense has improved in the season you have to go to like a pivotal moment which is uh their decision to having let jordan brooks walk who's playing very well in a very similar defense in miami like mike mcdonald obviously running like the thing that he did in Baltimore and there being like a spread of that proliferation of that uh league-wide um well they let Jordan Druk's walk they let Bobby Wagner walk who um was an all-pro uh whether you agree with that or not I don't but they let him walk and they signed Tyrell Dodson uh from Buffalo and Jerome Baker from Miami. And both those guys are no longer the starting linebackers. Both those guys are no longer with the football team.

So that shows you how well that decision played out. And they were really struggling in that first half of the season to play together. Like the first level and the second level were very disjointed in their run defense so they weren't able to stop the run like how the vikings stopped the run to have fun right and get into all those creative floyers looks mcdonald obviously you know that's where he really makes his money is the stress he puts on a quarterback in those clear passing situations but they weren't able to stop the run um you were having all these i was thinking about how the second half of the season baltimore um in 2023 went from a top five run defense via any metric to like 30th or worse

like and it's like oh my god is uh is mike mcdonald got a real problem with like he doesn't know how to to make a run defense is it just defense being streaky anyway then he goes and trades for ernest jones just for a fourth round pick who was playing for titan's defense that at the time was like a top five unit uh which feels a long time ago now but they were playing really good football and then rookie tyrese knight a fourth round pick he comes in out of UTEP and he's playing. So they've got two different linebackers. And lo and behold, now the front line and the D-line, who are very talented in terms of Leonard Williams,

who's played almost like an all-pro, which sounds lofty, but he's played very, very good football, particularly the last five weeks or so. And Jaron Reid's a really solid, savvy vet. They've got first-round pick in Byron Murphy. He gets on the field, but not as much as you might think, given how well those guys are playing. They're playing with more confidence.

They're really resetting the line of scrimmage, and they're defending the run really well. The second level behind kind of tweaked. McDonald against the Bills had a really, in my opinion, poor game in terms of the alignment he was putting them in for the run defense. I think there was some communication things going on there. It was Ernest Jones's first game. That's since been addressed. So everything was looking great. And you're like, wow, this defense is awesome. Then the Packers game happens, which

was like the opportunity to prove that this was a leading NFC team because they were on a big win streak. They'd have gone two games clear, I think think in the nfc west maybe just one game probably two games is it one is it two well let me look i don't know anyway they'd have established themselves like and to it on a national stage and the packers kind of had their way sitting in the first half the defense solidified in the second half if you look at the first half there's a lot of again communication probably trying to do a bit too much guys like not set at the snap talking to one another trying to like tweak the d-line alignment all that type of stuff and it was a mess to be shrank it was a mess so what then you think of is well actually if you know they're number one

they were i don't know how the previous game has impacted them but before that game they were number one since week nine in defensive epa for play right so they were cooking um and then that game happened and anything hang on though they did have two pick sixes um and they were kind of defending short fields and getting stops but in terms of like the non-turnover plays which the non-takeaway plays which those happen so you can be very happy about that but if you remove those plays they actually do give up kind of chunks through games and um they've been put in horrid spots by um special team snafus um and they've got a new returner now so that may not be an issue anymore but also poor offensive play but the Packers game it just reminds me of if you look at Kyle Shanahan versus Mike McDonald everyone in Seattle rightly gets excited about McDonald being a Kyle Shanahan killer so to speak

obviously the 49ers having a down year but you know what he did that was kind of the coming out party for the Ravens last year when they caused Brock Purdy so many issues. I think that was a primetime game. Anyway, but if you remove the non-takeaway plays in that instance as well, Shanahan has very good efficiency per play against McDonald. You look at what LeFleur was able to do the first time those two guys had played each other. He did some really nasty stuff. O'Connell's never played McDonald before. Has he?

Speaker 2 I don't think so. Did the Vikings play the Ravens? Not with O'Connell. I think the last time they played the Ravens was 2021 with Zimmer. Speaker 1 Right. So yeah, so there you go. So I'm really, really interested into one. It's obviously not the same offense, but you know you know, there are similarities between how the Packers and the Vikings move the football. I'm actually I you're like you're you're listeners and you would probably like to hear this. But I actually would be more frightened of Minnesota's offense right now I think particularly with um just how they how they move the football I think is going to be a big problem for for the Seahawks and yeah this is what I want to see from the defense like are they able to you know maybe give up a few less chunks or are they able to get those takeaways because the takeaways against Green Bay didn't happen and so the big chunks were happening they were down in a hole early on and i i honestly feel yeah they did improve in the second half but

uh the packers kind of went into let's just grind the game out now we don't need to get in our bag so much but they came with 15 plays like a lot of what nfo offenses do this is something bobby wagner spoke about before and ernest jones the new Seahawks linebacker spoke about after this past game something like football game the NFL offenses each week will come with like 15 new plays which they'll throw out there at the start and they're often problem plays which you know they've studied on tape have caused defense issues but they're also you know that the packers were using different types of motion that they hadn't shown before uh in the past like four game sample size so obviously minnesota will do the same because then if every nfl offense does stuff like that

and how how uh the seahawks adapt to that it's going to be um really interesting and i want to see them uh tested in this way I think just matchup wise I'm fascinated to see whether Rik Wollin who had a poor game last week is kind of up and down sometimes it almost comes off like a concentration thing like you know he's so talented he's so tall and long and fast and you know if you thought of like hey let's let's create a corner back on madden that would be the guy that you know when he gets beat it's almost startling because you're like what uh but does he shadow justin jefferson um you you spoke about o'connell's ability to you know uh come up with different looks right and and got and you mentioned a player describing

how challenging that was a corner i forget but But that's something that I think Woolen, if he's matching up with Jefferson, is going to struggle with. And, yeah, I mean, Jordan Anderson is one heck of a player as well. What a beautiful, like, number two receiver to have in that offense. His ability to come up with tough catches and and track the ball and and just go and get it and the seahawks will kind of i think that's what the love game showed uh last week like woolen had been letting guys get behind him a bit and they'd been kind of turning guys loose deep a bit and jordan love will throw that ball like he'll just be like yeah okay fine i've got like an incredible deep

accuracy I've seen a few Viking games this year and Sam Darnold I mean unbelievable story right but I think he's Jordan Love in terms of his deep ball ability and accuracy at the same time though he's throwing it up there and his guys are getting it and and heck, Jefferson and Addison are the types of guys who can go and do that. So, and I think that'll be a big part of the game because the Seahawks will present those and have been presenting those opportunities for offenses. But for me, the key is like,

if when this defense has struggled most often when well the seahawks have played their best football overall when they've stopped the run um and played ahead of the sticks like most defenses right but also they've got up to a big lead which is sometimes been because the defense has got a pick six and then uh got another interception and put the offense in good field position but like when they're playing with a lead they're really good team when it's a close game or when they're struggling early and the run games blended in very well and you know it's a very balanced offense that they're facing full of talented players and a very good play caller that's when they've had real issues and uh that's what the minnesota vikings look like to me so i am not optimistic from a seahawks perspective here but as a football fan i think this is going

to be so interesting to see because it's happened to the seahawks defense before like in these ways so you know have they learned does mcdon McDonald do something different? Does he adapt and adjust his play calling balance to start off with all these questions that will be answered? And I'm excited. Well, and the biggest thing is probably for the Vikings, the blitzes recently have caused them some problems. Just the free runners, adjusting protections. And Chicago didn't really do that to them. Maybe because they fired their coach. That was the defensive guy. Uh, they're just, I don't know what they're doing out there, but, uh, it, uh, when they played Arizona and they have, I think a really good defensive mind in Jonathan Gannon,

he found a lot of ways to mess with Sam Darnold to force the quarterback to make adjustments at the line of scrimmage and I think that with Sam Darnold he has been great across the board but if there's one area that maybe he can be taken advantage of we saw that specifically against Arizona and then the following week against Atlanta too where Atlanta doesn't really pressure people but they found some some guys, uh, the 52 yard touchdown. He threw to Jefferson that made all the highlight reels. Well, that was a free running safety at Sam Darnold. And that was why it was so spectacular.

Otherwise he would have just caught it and thrown a touchdown to Justin Jefferson, uh, if from the pocket and not had to do the whole scramble thing. And I think that with Seattle, the talent that they have on defense, if you get free runners, if you get problems caused with sending blitzes and forcing an offensive line that's still adjusting to a new right guard, a new left tackle that were replaced in midseason, then there can be a little bit of, wait, who was supposed to have that? JTO Sullivan on his video says, who's who in the zoo,

which is kind of the thing like sorting out, wait, am I getting that guy? Was that guy responsible for the quarterback? Was that supposed to go to a hot read? Things like that, that I think for an offense that's been so good and so explosive, it still has that little bit of a missing piece. And how they deal with Justin Jefferson. This is where you can watch tape from previous games and then you'll watch a defense play and go, well, that didn't look like what they've done before because Justin Jefferson plays for this football team. It's hard to even prepare for the Vikings because

they just do different stuff to make sure that there's two bodies on him at all times. It was a sauce gardener who talked about O'Connell playing games with the corners. And specifically what he talked about was bunch formations and late motions. So he'll have a bunch and then you'll think, okay, I got this guy, I got that guy. And then at the very last second, someone will shift positions and then get to the top of their routes they're like who's going where yeah and how do we sort that out like what O'Connell knows how to do is understand what the defense's assignments are and say to them what are you going

to do about this like I know how you're going to play it so we're going to make the adjustment to play toward the way that you play if that makes sense right no totally and like that's exactly what i was kind of thinking with the the bunch stuff and the condensed stuff like in my mind i have the jefferson touchdown against atlanta where not only is he uh from a bunch set but he he does that kind of motion to to distress them so basically what what uh o'Connell got for him was a head start right because he gets a running start a clean release um oh and a two-way go where you know because he's got a cut split he can go corner or post and and he ran like an in cut and it's a

touchdown um oh and he he got him like purely one-on-one as well because he threw something at the post-safety, a different type of route before Jefferson's broke in. So, yeah, that's the type of stuff that I think... Woolen is a very talented mover for his size, but he's still long-legged, and that's really difficult to deal with. In terms of the blitzing, I don't think... McDonalddonald does blitz obviously but

like he actually really likes trying to get pressure with four guys now he can simulate pressure obviously you know send a second level guy uh but drop a first level guy so he's still rushing four but it looks like a blitz um he will use cover zero um more kind of as a run stopping call. But then also like in those clear passing downs, that's when he'll get into his bag and do like the really creative blitzing stuff. But yeah, I think the, the Packers game, there's a, there's a few pressures, but because, you know, they couldn't stop the run, they didn't want to get too like wacky. And I would like to see some more run-focused blitzing

as a countermeasure. But yeah, I'm repeating myself. It's going to be a really good matchup. Devin Witherspoon is obviously a standout player for the Seahawks. He's electric and he kind of a lot of his best stuff this year's not gone unseen but it doesn't show up in a box score uh but like you know he's a very savvy player can play in the slot and he's really good at like underneath zone coverage and stuff and has really good feel and instincts and just inherent like playmaking in his brain uh but also you know can

play outside and and match up with guys and and uh yeah and blitz as well which um he's a fun player and then julian love is a he received an all pro vote last year which is kind of uh crazy really but good for him um he had a pick six in prime time against an east coast team so that's probably part of it um but he's been a very good safety in terms of open field tackling second level stuff and and the edge group is very talented as you mentioned with a former gopher boy mafe kind of being the star but uh derrick hall as well has been uh he's a very kind of like bend through contact guy uchenna n woes he's just come back from injury and he uh before he got injured the first time in 2023 was like the star of the seahawks defense when they had a good run defense

and him going down kind of killed their whole uh well there was knock-on effects on that which were not good but he can make real splash plays against the run so it's a very talented d-line ernie jones who's playing great football inside backer um tyree snite is a guy if you see like the vikings run to the short side of the field a lot or or run to the the weak side um that would probably be that would probably be because knight as a rookie everything's going really fast for him and you know his eyes sometimes are in the wrong spot for a second and or not even a second like a moment but in the nfl if that happens as a linebacker you're done you're toast so he's a guy who i've i've felt watching tape back um each week offenses try

and go at him particularly in their opening 15 plays that we spoke about that you know the uh designer stuff for that upcoming opponent so yeah might might see aaron jones uh running downhill at him well i agree with you completely that this is a fascinating matchup and it is not one that the Vikings should be taken lightly though, because even if there might be a coaching advantage from one offensive play caller to the other, this is a Seattle team that is in a fight to win that division for a reason, a lot of talent on this roster. And I also think it is a not great matchup for the talent that they have when opposing teams have brought in great wide receivers or veteran quarterbacks or pass rushers, blitz packages, corners who can cover. It makes it a lot more difficult on this Vikings team, and they haven't seen as complete of a roster as they're going to see against Seattle.

So last thing, who do you think wins the football game? Well, the Seahawks do have a good record against Minnesota, don't they? But I do think it's different teams. As you said, it's a very important game for Minnesota, isn't it, as well? But I do think the Seahawks lose this. But it's also one just killer analysis it's also one i wouldn't be shocked if they do actually no i would be shocked if they win i have not seen anything really from the offense is very uninspiring and i don't see them magically turning a corner with with how well the vikings play and just their style of play

on that side of the ball um so yeah but like for seattle like the magnitude of this one is like if they lose this there's all sorts of bad tiebreakers because they lost to the giants like an nfc opponent uh there's all sorts of horrid tiebreakers that are going to come in and they may well miss the playoffs they also have to play the rams in week 18 i think week 18 is loads of divisional matchups isn't it but anyway um playing the rams then who are like vying for the top spot in the nsc west like you can't really drop any games now and um yeah so we'll see how uh how this one goes this is the most that i've been leaning toward the other team against the Vikings in quite some time because the desperation of Seattle,

the home field advantage, which I think is still real, but maybe not. No, no, no. Oh, we should talk about that. All right. That's a whole, that's a whole thing for, um, that's a whole thing for like people obviously watching the Seahawks, but that's been a massive topic in seattle of how i mean i i've noticed it for perhaps a couple of years but this year like every single opposing fan base has like it's looked on television like 50 50 split wow and uh particularly if a team gets up like early like you heard go pack go and the packers fans travel well right but you heard go pack go after the first drive um and the packers

and chris collinsworth um having to talk about seattle needing to go maybe to a silent count at home at lumenfield so yeah the whole um the 12s thing that they they might need to review their ticketing policy on a season ticket holders selling tickets to opposing fan bases but that's something dk metcalf like straight up said in his press conference this week about noticing that there's opposition fans like a lot of them um the 14-9ers did it i mean minnesota fans travel well right very yep very there you go you could get a a skull in in lumen field that would be a viking what'd you call it viking clap viking yeah chant clap whatever uh that's yeah how about that i mean i did hear the go pack go but i kind of expect that just because green bay fans are everywhere because of brett farve um but you know you're

you're right though that vikings fans do travel extremely well last year they loaded up like cincinnati to see nick mullins and jake browning that was oh yeah that to me was the most impressive feat of vikings fans taking over a stadium in cincinnati for mullins v jake browning this one's got a little more juice than that. So, okay, well, I guess maybe the own field advantage isn't as significant. The short week for the Vikings coming off Monday night football, and they've won seven in a row.

It's really hard to win eight in a row when you're playing good teams, but then I think it's just a great football matchup and we'll see how it plays out. But your analysis also great. Maddie F Brown. You can find them over at seattle overload seahawks on tape on substack and one of my go-to people to understand what is going on in the pacific northwest um great stuff man it was great to have you on the show i'm glad we

could do this in podcast form for the very first time and uh enjoy the the football game thanks for your time uh thanks for having me Matthew uh I enjoyed it I'm excited for the game now I want it I want it to be tomorrow but a few more days by the time people listen to this it'll be uh it'll be the game so uh all right well everybody thanks for your time as always for watching and listening and we'll catch you later football